What’s the official story on the Coen Brothers and their split after 2018’s “The Ballad Of Buster Scruggs“? According to Ethan Coen, it wasn’t anything acrimonious at all, but instead him taking a break. And yes, they’ll reteam soon, but there’s no official timetable for that yet.
Ethan clarified why he and his brother Joel have been working separately for the past several years on the latest edition of Deadline’s “Crew Call” podcast, available to stream now. And in typical Coen-esque, the director started his answer about where he and his brother stand with a bit of dry humor. “No, I’ll tell you what happened. He borrowed the lawnmower and he brought it back and he hadn’t cleaned the blades I thought, this is bullshit. We’re done,” Ethan joked. “No no, no. Nothing happened. No rift or anything, right? He started doing different things.”
“Well, actually, I, I started by kind of quitting,” he continued. “I kind of went, ‘Okay, you know, the last two movies me and Joel did were really hard [“The Ballad Of Buster Scruggs” and 2016’s “Hail Caesar!“], in terms of production. So I don’t want to do it anymore.’ And I’m, I’m old and tired, so I kind of bowed out and Joel understood what I meant because he’s a little old and tired, but not as old and tired.
Ethan bowing out led Joel to move forward with his “Macbeth” adaptation without his brother. “So he went on to do another movie and then me and Trishia [Cooke] did this documentary together [2022’s “Jerry Lee Lewis: Trouble In Mind“], which was all archival found footage,” said Ethan. “And I thought, ‘oh, I actually kind of like this. so we went on to pursue our things while Joel was doing his movie.'”
Since then, explained Ethan, the brothers have been on their separate paths: Ethan’s made “Drive-Away Dolls” and “Honey Don’t!” with Cooke, while Joel has another solo effort, “Jake Of Spades” with Josh O’Connor, he’s shooting in the UK now. “He’s doing a movie now, he just started shooting,” Ethan confirmed. “So we haven’t resynced, but we’ve written one to do together. I’m sure we’ll do, you know, we got to kind of get on the same schedule page again.”
And what will be the Coens’ first movie working together again? Apparently, a horror movie, a genre that they haven’t worked in before. That sounds fun, but it’s not clear when the two will reunite to make it. Maybe after Joel finishes work on “Jack Of Spades,” but Ethan and Cooke also have to wrap up their “lesbian b-movie trilogy” too. More on that in another story later today.
As for Ethan’s latest romp with Cooke, “Honey Don’t!” hits theaters tomorrow. Watch a new clip from the film below.
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